


The One Where the Haus Finds Out

by implausiblesuspension



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Comic 3.12 "Bitty & I", Coming Out, Fluff, Friendship, Humor, Inspired by Friends (TV), M/M, Secrets, this is canon you can't change my mind, this is literally just Friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:07:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26199817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/implausiblesuspension/pseuds/implausiblesuspension
Summary: Honestly, they all should have seen this coming.A Check, Please! rewrite of The One Where Everybody Finds Out because I think I'm hilarious
Relationships: Eric "Bitty" Bittle/Jack Zimmermann
Comments: 7
Kudos: 127





	1. Lardo & Shitty

Honestly, Lardo should have seen this coming.

Everyone in the Haus could see that Bitty hadn’t been himself this semester. Even Shitty had commented on it more than a few times. There would be days he seemed happier than ever, giggling and bubbly. But other days, more often than not, he would be withdrawn and exhausted.

Bitty seemed to be constantly torn between two extremes. The only thing holding Lardo back from pressing him even more about the down times was because of how happy he seemed to be during the up times. She, Ransom, and Holster had been subtly-not-so-subtly trying to pry and get him to open up, but he always blew them off.

The constant visits to his cousin at Brown and Providence and hiding himself away in his room had been noticeably taking their tolls on him. Of course, there was also never a shortage of baked goods in the kitchen. Lardo was seriously concerned about his grades. Which is why, whenever Bitty asks to study in Lardo’s room (whether or not she’s there), the answer is always yes.

Bitty had been in a good mood this morning, so the two of them were studying together. Which, of course, entailed Bitty sprawled out on her bean bag chair and the two of them talking about everything except for school. They’d gotten distracted and lost track of time, so Bitty had to literally run out of her room to his class. When he left, Lardo had put in her earbuds and gotten absorbed in her art critique essay.

Now, almost an hour later, Lardo finishes her paper and sends it off to Nursey. Pulling her earbuds out, she looks at her phone and sees a text from Bitty.

 **TEXT FROM BITS:**  
LARDOOOOO!  
DID I LEAVE MY NOTES IN YOUR ROOM, GIRL?

Lardo chuckles, pushing away from her desk to where she sees Bitty’s notebook on the bean bag chair. The front cover is open, and inside, she can see the first page of his notes. And...really it shouldn’t surprise her as much as it does.

 **ME:**  
I THINK SO?

She texts Bitty back quickly but stares at the notebook for longer than she should. “Falconers” is written a couple of times surrounded by hearts (which is seriously on-brand for Bitty). It all clicks into place when she sees “#1,” Jack’s number, among the hearts.

Well, now she’s really glad she hadn’t pressed Bits to give up information, and Lardo silently vows to herself to keep their secret until they’re ready to be out.

* * *

Shitty was fuckin’ _hype_ when Jack finally invited him over to his Providence apartment. It had only taken a brah like six months or whatever, but Shitty didn’t want to push...that much. But Shitty knew Jack was hiding something. And he was dying for deets on the secret girlfriend! It was driving him fucking NUTS.

Shitty understands the need for secrecy because new career and everyone’s looking at him and whatever, but they’re best bros! They share everything! Despite popular belief, Shitty does respect boundaries, so he’s been relying a lot on what the team at the Haus knows. Bitty talks to Jack as much as Shitty does. Fuck, maybe even more. So if Bitty doesn’t know, then no one knows.

But whatever, right? Shitty could be patient. He could wait for deets. The important thing now is that Shitty is finally walking through the door to Jack’s sweet ass Providence Pad. He’d gone to the Falconers’ home game tonight (which Jack fuckin’ SLAYED with a goal and an assist), and now Shitty is, like, walking through the doors of the fucking Taj Mahal.

“Brah, this is sick!” Shitty says after Le Grand Tour.

Jack, sheepish as always, just laughs it off. “Yeah, I didn’t pick out most of the stuff in here, but I like it,” he says but with a secretive smirk. “I’m gonna go get out of these interview clothes.”

Jack walks into his bedroom, but he doesn’t bother closing the door. Shitty, on the other hand, unbuttons his shirt and walks into Jack’s kitchen, fully intending to find it a barren wasteland of exclusively protein shake ingredients and chicken. What he finds, however, is a fully stocked kitchen with a whole bunch of shit he’s pretty sure Bitty uses. Brah even has a rolling pin?

Of course, Shitty’s initial thought is that Alicia wanted to make sure Jack has everything he needs “just in case,” which makes sense if Jack didn’t pick out the furniture and just had his mother do it for him.

The secondary thought is that Secret Girlfriend picked it all out and that Secret Girlfriend cooks and that Secret Girlfriend cooks for Jack (because brah is not the most capable kitchen-hand). Shitty heads for the fridge, looking for some kind of evidence within her chilly doors. If there’s no real food in the fridge, then the culprit of the equipment is Alicia. But if there’s actual fresh real food, then it must be Secret Girlfriend.

“Thanks for finally letting me crash here, JackOOOHHHH.” Shitty, upon opening the fridge, is distracted by the assortment of post-it notes on the freezer door. Through his bewilderment, he vaguely hears Jack shout something back at him.

_Love, B…_

Shitty stares for a moment. This proves the Secret Girlfriend theory. But something about the notes seems so familiar to him…

Jack comes back in the room, and Shitty gets distracted throughout the rest of the night as they blab and Jack heats up some food from his freezer (which smells fucking delicious) and then it’s _way_ past Jack’s self-appointed bedtime so they go to bed.

Shitty is about to pass the fuck out when the epiphany hits him.

He almost topples out of Jack’s (really fucking comfortable) guest bed trying to grab his phone. It’s not that late, and Lardo is definitely awake. But...Shitty pauses right before he goes to text her. Obviously they wanted to keep it a secret, and Shitty...feels super fucking shameful and heteronormative because he assumed that Jack had a girlfriend and barely even fucking considered that it might be a not-girl.

Of course, Shitty knew Jack was into girls and not-girls, so of course he’s not shocked that Jack’s dating a guy, and of fucking course him dating a guy means that he had to be even more secretive and careful because the NHL is super fucking homophobic for some fucking reason. Shitty was so easily swept up into the heterosexual standard that Mashkov spouted, and didn’t even stop to consider that Jack-

He unlocks his phone, opens Snapchat, and texts Lardo before he spirals too deep.

 **ME**  
LARDO  
psssst  
lardo

 **LARDS**  
yes?

 **ME**  
i have to tell you smth  
but like  
you can’t tell anyone

 **LARDS**  
no  
no no no  
Shitty I do not want to know.

 **ME**  
YES YOU DO  
this is UNBELIEVABLE

 **LARDS**  
no I am tired of being the brah who knows everybody’s secrets and can’t tell anyone

 **ME**  
WHAT SECRETS  
YOU KNOW SECRETS  
BRAH CODE SAYS YOU GOTTA TELL ME

 **LARDS**  
NO IT DOESN’T  
BRAH CODE SAYS I GOTTA KEEP THE SECRETS  
And so should you.

 **ME**  
LARDO this is one secret i hAVE TO TELL YOU  
and im only gonna tell YOU

 **LARDS**  
no  
Go the fuck to sleep.

Lardo’s bitmoji disappears from the bottom of the text screen, and Shitty is defeated. He locks his phone and flops over. He’s glad that he and Jack were already planning on heading to the Haus tomorrow because he has got to fucking tell someone. And he doesn’t want to ruin it for Jack.

Yet.

* * *

Shitty is going to lose his fucking mind.

He and Jack drove up to Samwell after Jack’s practice this morning to catch the SMH evening game. And now having the goddamned proof, Shitty’s seeing the signs fucking everywhere and how in the fuck did he fucking miss it up until this point and how did they keep it a secret for God knows how long.

Over the last couple of hours, Shitty has been thinking a lot about whether or not to tell Lardo. Brah Code definitely states that Shitty cannot tell a bro's secrets, even when said secret is a stupid fucking secret that he wouldn’t leak to journos if bro would just fucking tell him. But UGH he really fucking gets it that Jack won’t tell him. He understands, but he's still gonna be frustrated about it. He’s also, like, 92% fucking sure that Lardo already knows, but he needs confirmation of his confirmation. And he’s just gotta get that.

After the game, everyone crammed into the Haus for a typical loud night of Mario Kart, board games, and mini pies. Jack was the first to turn in, going to “sleep on the air mattress on Bittle’s floor.” Before, Shitty wouldn’t have even batted an eye. Now, he gets tres suspicious.

Bitty didn’t jump up right away, as Shitty predicted he would have, and the frogs were the next ones to leave. Then in sequence, Bitty, Ransom, and Holster all filed upstairs to crash, leaving Lardo and Shitty alone on the couch.

From where he’s lying (sprawled across the couch with Lardo’s legs tossed over his), Shitty waits until he hears Bitty’s door close and other movement upstairs cease.

“Hey Lards,” Shitty starts casually. (Well, he tries to sound casual, but he’s pretty sure he’s too excited/nervous to be actually breezy.) “Remember that secret I was going to tell you yesterday…”

“Shitty-”

“No, no I’m not going to tell you. Don’t worry.” He doesn’t move from his spot where he’s watching some dumb sitcom rerun on the TV, and Lardo doesn’t move from where she’s scrolling on Instagram. “But if you found out on your own, that would be okay, and then we could talk about it, right?”

Lardo looks up at him with squinty eyes. Super suspicious. “Well then it wouldn’t be a secret anymore so...yeah. I guess so.”

“Alright, cool, cool.” And Shitty leaves it at that for a minute. Lardo can definitely tell he’s not done.

After a tense two minutes, Shitty brings it up again. “Hey, Lards, would you mind going up and getting that book I loaned Bitty back for me?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Shitty can see Lardo freeze. “Now? You...you want me to go get it now?”

“Yeah, he’s definitely still awake.”

Lardo turns her head towards Shitty, who is looking directly at Lardo. “Do you know something?”

“Do you know something?” Shitty questions back immediately and quickly.

“I might know something,” Lardo responds, fucking super cagey, but Shitty’s gonna get it out of her.

“I might know something, too.”

They haven’t moved. They’re still just sprawled out on the couch, daring the other to make a fucking move.

“What’s the thing that you know?” she asks.

“Nope, I can’t tell you what I know until you tell me what you know,” Shitty says, trying not to smirk.

“I can’t tell you what I know.”

“Well then, I can’t tell you what I know.”

“Well then,” Lardo finishes with a huff, physically shifting her body to go back to her phone, though Shitty can tell she’s not paying attention to it. He can literally feel her side eye while he’s staring at the TV again, though he’s not paying attention either.

After a tense minute or so (it feels like so much fucking longer), “You don’t know,” she dismisses, her eyes becoming super small slits as she glares at him. But Shitty’s had enough.

“Fine! Then I will just go up to Bitty’s room and see if the thing that I think that I know is actually the thing that I think that I fucking know!” Shitty then jumps off the couch, and Lardo is thrown off balance.

As he starts to walk away, Lardo jumps up onto the arm of the couch, points at Shitty, and whisper-screams, “You know!”

Shitty points back at her from the doorway to the den. “And you know!!”

“Yeah, I know!” she says as she jumps down from the couch.

“Brah, this is fucking ridiculous!”

“Shh!” Lardo says to Shitty as she gets closer to him. “Dude, I’ve been dying to talk to someone about this, but you cannot tell anyone. They’re super weird about it.”

Shitty is about to respond, but he’s interrupted by Holster’s loud footsteps as he comes clunking down the stairs. Shitty and Lardo jump apart and try not to look guilty.

Holster, suspicious, says, “Uh, hey guys. Water break?”

“Cool, cool, cool, well I was just heading off to bed,” Lardo says as she walks past him and upstairs, giving Shitty a _look_ after she’s out of Holster’s view.

Shitty and Holster stare at each other for a second before Shitty starts to follow Lardo. “Yeah, yeah, me too.”

Before he gets all the way upstairs, he hears Holster say to himself, “I bet they’re doing it. HA.”

* * *

“Dude, I have to confront them about this. It’s ridiculous,” Shitty says to Lardo later that night.

“Shitty, no,” Lardo says, trying to keep him in her room. “You know that would just make things worse.”

“I thought we were best bros! Best bros tell each other shit like this!” Shitty says as he walks out the door and over to Bitty’s room, where he’s sure Jack and Bitty are doing less than savory things.

As he gets closer, though, he hears Jack talking. _Pillow talk?_

“...I’m a terrible liar, Bits, and I just really hate having to lie to all of them. Shitty in particular.” Shitty stops outside the door, feeling bad for eavesdropping, but his curiosity wins out.

“I thought you weren’t ready to be out yet?” Bitty asks him.

“I mean, I’m technically already out to Shitty. He knows, but…” Jack trails off, and Shitty can almost picture the concerned look on Bitty’s face.

Bitty finishes the thought for him. “But we’re not ready to tell yet?”

 _They are nauseatingly adorable_ , Shitty thinks, having second thoughts about barging in on them.

“He’s my best friend, and he’s the one person besides you that I tell everything to,” Jack says with a sigh. “Guy like that means a lot to you, eh?”

As Bitty giggles ( _FUCKIN GROSS_ ), Shitty starts to back away from the door, resolving to let them have their peace. When he gets back to Lardo’s room, he’s definitely crying because goddammit he fucking loves Jack Zimmermann.

* * *

The next morning, Jack leaves for Providence, but Shitty sticks around the Haus for a little while longer before heading back up to Boston. He and Lardo are in the kitchen and are the only ones awake. Shitty is sitting on the counter (something Bitty never lets him do), and Lardo is at the table while they’re eating bagels and drinking coffee. It’s super domestic shit.

“Come on, Lardy Lards, I need more deets!” Shitty presses.

Lardo rolls her eyes at him. “Bro, I told you everything I know last night.”

“But you don’t know anything!”

Lardo gets a weird look in her eyes when she says, “I do know one thing.”

“What is it?!”

“They did it right there on the counter.”


	2. Ransom & Holster

Speaking as a college senior with vast amounts of senioritis, an email from a professor saying "no class today" is probably the greatest thing that could ever happen before noon.

Of course, some professors are extra and don't email students, instead choosing to leave a piece of paper on the door to the usual classroom that says "SENIOR SEM CANCELLED TODAY," but sure that's fine too. Ransom and Holster had gone through the trouble of actually getting up for the 12:30 class and walking across campus before having to turn right back around but whatever. It's fine.

Now they trek back to the Haus to go right the fuck back to sleep, though. Lardo must not be far behind them, since she probably came from her morning class and they haven’t crossed paths with her on their way back to the Haus yet.

They come up around the back of the Haus before heading in. Holster and Bitty had stayed up way too late last night watching Scandal, and Ransom was still awake doing homework when Holster had come upstairs, so neither of them really has the brain capacity to be having a conversation. When they get into the Haus, they can hear Bitty in the kitchen (and dude, how is he that chipper this morning?).

If they were half-asleep when they walked in the door, they are definitely wide awake after hearing Bitty.

“Jack Laurent Zimmermann, you are the sweetest, handsomest, silliest boy on this planet, and you cannot go a single phone call without trying to rile you boyfriend up with your chirping, you lovely trouble-making young man--”

Holster’s mouth is practically on the floor when Ransom turns around to look at him, and they both have matching wide-eyed, completely baffled looks. “We take this to the grave,” Ransom says.

Holster, still in shock, raises his hand to point at Bitty, incapable of speech. Ransom starts to herd him out the back door before Holster starts to scream. They’re a couple of yards away from the Haus when Holster explodes.

“OH. OH. OHHHH!!!” he says while still pointing towards the kitchen as Ransom tries to herd him away from the Haus, just so Bitty won’t hear. “Jack and Bitty. JACK AND BITTY.”

“Oh, my fucking GOD,” Ransom shouts, once they’re safely away.

“My EARS!” Holster exclaims, covering his ears and trying not to hear the disgusting mushy fluff fest that Bitty just said to Jack Zimmermann. “MY EARS.”

Ransom and Holster are just fucking standing there screaming at each other when Lardo comes up behind them. “Will you idiots shut up?!”

“NO, they’re DOING IT!!!” Holster screams, beyond calming at this point.

Ransom, the more rational, actually is capable of having a conversation re: what the fuck they just witnessed and loudy says, “Lardo, we just heard Bitty and Jack, and they are definitely-”

Lardo glares at them like they're morons. “It’s okay, guys, I know.”

“YOU KNOW?!” Holster and Ransom scream.

“Yes, I know, and Shitty knows, but the frogs and Bitty don’t know, so you two have to stop screaming!!” Lardo shouts back at them.

Ransom and Holster, dumbfounded for the second time in five minutes, literally do not have the ability to say anything. Luckily (or unluckily), Chowder chooses that moment to walk up behind them.

“Hey guys! What’s with all the screaming?” he asks, with his usual Chowder excitement and obliviousness.

First to recover, Ransom picks right back up and starts screaming again, “We’re just excited because our class got cancelled today!!” Holster jumps right on the train of thought and begins whooping and shouting in excitement. Then Lardo gets in on it, and the three seniors are shouting and jumping around at 12:30 in the morning in the middle of the street.

Lardo says to Chowder, “Come on, Chow, get in on this!” And that’s all it takes before all four of them are screaming like the loud hockey bros they are. Holster hopes that all of the screaming attracts Bitty's attention so that he knows they're there and so that they don't have to walk in on him being gross about Jack ever again. (At least, not while they can't be fined.)

Right on cue, Bitty sticks his head out the kitchen window and (somehow louder than the four of them combined) yells at them, “Y’all, quit disruptin’ our neighbors and come inside for lunch!”

As they make their way into the Haus, laughing and full of energy, Lardo gives the D-Men a side eye that definitely means “we’re gonna talk later.”

* * *

After lunch and afternoon practice, Lardo makes her way up to the attic to talk some sense into Ransom and Holster. She brings her laptop, too, so that they can Skype Shitty in on the conversation, because she knows that he won't want to be left out.

Lardo takes her place on top of Holster’s desk while Ransom is at his and Holster is on his bunk.

“Okay,” Ransom starts, “what the actual fuck?”

Lardo hits the “Call” button next to Shitty’s face on Skype and sets it on the desk so that it can see all three of them. “It’s been going on for a while now, as far as I know,” she says. “I found out two weeks ago, Shitty last weekend.”

Holster starts to put some things together. “Wait, you mean that whenever Bitty was down visiting his ‘cousin’ or when Jack would come up here--”

“Or all those times he sneaks away for phone calls??” Ransom adds.

Lardo laughs. “Yep. Doin’ it, doin’ it. Phone? Doin’ it.”

“I just don’t believe it,” Ransom says. “I mean, it’s great, but still. Why didn't Jack tell us he liked dudes?”

The Skype call finally connects, and Shitty’s bright, exuberant voice brings the room to life. “Lardo, my favorite dude bro, what is the happs?”

“Hey, Shits,” Lardo says, “Rans and Holtzy just found out about Jack and Bitty.”

“You mean, how they’re just friends and nothing more?” Shitty says quickly.

Holster waves a foot up in the air from his bunk and responds, “Nah, brah, we caught Bits in the kitchen on the phone with Jack.”

“Not even subtle at all, bro,” Rans chimes in.

Shitty takes a dramatic gasp. “You caught them having phone sex in the kitchen??!”

Holster shakes his head sadly. “Worse. We caught Bitty gushing about his boyfriend.”

Ransom comments, “Total barf fest. If I had eaten breakfast, it would have come right back up.”

Shitty glares at his screen, says, “What’s this I hear? Not eating breakfast, Oluransi--”

Holster cuts him off before he can go off about the necessity of eating in the morning. “SO Bitty and Jack have no idea that you guys know?”

Holster’s tactic works, and Shitty is immediately distracted. “Yes! But that doesn’t matter because now enough of us know that we can just tell them we know! All the lying and the secrets can finally be over.” Shitty cheers and flops backwards onto his bed.

Lardo disrupts his excitement and says, “Dude no. We have to let them do this on their own time.”

“Lardo’s right,” Ransom agrees. “It’s not our place. They have to be ready.”

Shitty sits up with a comical frown. “I mean yes, but I just really fucking want them to be happy together okay?”

Lardo agrees, but she’s sure now it won’t be long until they decide for themselves that it’s time to tell their friends.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this sucks but i wrote it during class because much like holster i have senioritis and also i just think it's funny lol


End file.
